Pentagon Designates China-Backed Campus Cultural Centres a National Security Threat, Hegseth Claims 80 'Propaganda Cells' Dismantled

The US defence department has designated Chinese-funded cultural centres on university campuses, known as Confucius Institutes, as a threat to US national security, defence secretary Pete Hegseth said on Friday.

Washington has long accused Confucius Institutes of being Chinese propaganda tools and has taken steps to crack down on them. This designation is the latest and toughest step in that continuing campaign.

In a video posted on social media, Hegseth alleged that Confucius Institutes were operating in disguise at US universities, and that the Pentagon had added them to its list of institutions that threaten US national security.

Hegseth said it turned out that 80 new propaganda cells across 30 universities had popped up using different names and different charters, but with the same mission: to steal intellectual property and to infiltrate the minds of American students.

The defence department over the past two months has, he said, systematically dismantled every single one of these organisations. In other words, according to the Pentagon, the identified centres have already been shut down.

There has been no immediate Chinese reaction to the announcement. The Chinese embassy in Washington did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Confucius Institutes were set up at universities around the world as centres for Chinese language and cultural teaching. In the United States, however, controversy around them is not new; Washington alleges that, behind education and culture, they serve as vehicles for Beijing's influence.

The Pentagon's move raises the prospect of a further shrinking of academic ties between US universities and Chinese institutions. With the centres placed on a national security list, institutions linked to them may also find it harder to work with the defence department.

Analysts see the decision as part of the wider strategic rivalry between the United States and China, in which education and culture have now joined trade and technology as arenas of competition.

Attention will now turn to the Chinese embassy's formal response and to the steps taken by the universities concerned — especially those campuses where the Pentagon claims the centres were operating under different names.